how much she’d worked me up. At least the ride out to the Nighthawks’ clubhouse gave me the time to pull my shit together. I turned into the parking lot, nodding to the prospect standing watch outside. He looked like he was fifteen years old, and I couldn’t see him weighing much over a hundred and twenty-five pounds. Marsh was obviously scraping bottom at this point.
“I’m here to see Talia,” I told him, and he nodded, his face distinctly uncomfortable. Great, she must be up to something. Just what I needed to deal with tonight.
“She’s right inside.”
I opened the door to find the clubhouse maybe half full. Men wearing Nighthawks colors sat around talking, and girls flitted back and forth, fetching beer and giggling. Along one wall I spotted Cord and the other malcontents watching the rest with calculating eyes. A few women wearing leather vests sat with them—their old ladies. I’d been studying them closely and was convinced that Cord and his group wanted Marsh gone as much as the Reapers did. That added urgency to the situation, because sooner or later they’d stop watching and waiting. Then we’d have a civil war on our hands and that’d bring down trouble on all the clubs.
I looked around for Talia, spotting her toward the back of the room. Sitting on another man’s lap. Fuck. I knew him—Mike something-or-other, another hangaround. The thought struck me—another hangaround—because that’s all I could be right now. A fucking hangaround, after nineteen years with the Reapers. Going undercover sucked—I missed my club colors.
Talia glanced toward me and I saw her eyes harden. Great. I was supposed to be out here an hour ago, but I’d eaten dinner with Tinker instead. Now she was going to punish me. Deliberately turning her back on me, she swung a leg over Mike’s lap and straddled him, her mouth covering his. She obviously wanted a scene, and I’d have to give it to her or roll over and beg like a pussy.
Heh. Wouldn’t that serve her right.
Eyes followed me as I strolled across the room, resigned to playing my part. At least she’d picked a nobody. If I confronted one of the brothers, they’d kill me.
Little cunt.
If shit like this happened back home with a woman I was seeing, we’d have a problem but it wouldn’t last for long. No brother would pull that on me, and if another man was stupid enough to touch what was mine, I’d put him in the ground.
In Hallies Falls, things were more complicated.
These men weren’t my brothers, and they had no reason to back me up. If she’d chosen one of them, it’d all be over because it’d be me against the whole club. She obviously knew that, so she’d picked out a nobody, forcing my hand. If I told her to fuck off, I’d lose my connection to the club. Even worse, it might be seen as an insult to her brother. I’d watched him enough over the past few weeks to know he was erratic as fuck—what made him laugh one night would lead to him beating a man half to death the next. Sure sign he was using his own product. You take a man who starts out as a sociopath and start to give him meth, things get ugly fast. Now the little bitch would get her scene, which pissed me right off. Probably a good thing—it put me in a fighting mood.
That’d make what had to happen here a lot easier.
I moved across the room toward them, playing my part because Talia needed my jealousy to feed her ego. Marsh stepped out of the hallway in the back, presumably to enjoy the show. I caught his eye, then jerked my chin toward the couple making out. Marsh smirked, but he nodded his head and I knew I was in the clear to take care of business.
Catching Talia’s arm, I jerked her off the man’s lap. She fell to the floor as I caught him by the front of his shirt and pulled him to his feet.
“You don’t touch what’s mine,” I growled. “Now get the fuck outside and we’ll finish it.”
He held up his hands.
“No need to fight over a gash.”
“That’s my sister you’re callin’ a gash,” Marsh said loudly, obviously enjoying himself. “You sayin’ she’s not worth fighting over?”
I could practically see the thoughts racing through Mike’s head as he finally realized just how fucked up the situation was. Man apparently wasn’t that bright.